Northeastern+Educational+IU+19

3.Northeastern Educational IU 19

Tim Snyder Alexandra Konsur My goals this year are to introduce new teachers to emergent 21st Century technologies, convince the School Board at my district that my job is worthy of funding for next year (I am not a permanent coach), getting a spot on the Administrative team to make them aware of issues in the building/district, and get the administration to collaborate on a shared vision for how they want their schools to look moving forward. The challenges I have to these goals are many. We have a budget deficit in our district at the time when the warranties are expiring on our CFF equipment, and grant money is drying up at the state level. This makes it extremely difficult for me to convince the School Board that my position is worth budgeting for for the future. In addition, there is not support for classroom technology and a technology coach at the administrative level because those individuals do not see technology as necessary to good education. They are willing to pay $40,000.00 per grade level per subject for new textbooks, but will not purchase replacement batteries for laptops. My strategy to overcome this is to join the administrative team at the district to make them aware of issues in the district, as well as wonderful things that teachers are doing with the technology that we do have (before it all breaks and they don’t replace it). I plan on giving presentations/status updates to our local school board, bringing in students to report during meetings, and spreading the word of what we are doing wherever and whenever I can. My hope is that my school will look like a true school of the future. I picture that classrooms will be engaged in higher order thinking using PBL, constructivist, and inquiry-based methodologies that are differentiated in their delivery and assessment. The school will have administrators that have a shared vision for what the students and teachers should be doing. And, technology will be “like oxygen: ubiquitous and invisible” (Chris Lehman).
 * 1)  My Mission will be to start a process of changing my school districts policy on Mobile devises. After attending the Breakout Sessions” Mobile Devices in (and Out) of the Classroom” and “Mobile Learning with QR codes” I am motivated and can see the advantages for using mobile devices in education.
 * 2)  My vision of my school would give every student the ability to use a device in every class and at all times in and out of school. The devices would vary depending on need and abilities and would allow the students a connection to the internet and the school network resources.

Patty Smith - My Mission

1. My goals as in instructional coach are to: a. incorporate more project based learning activities b. addressing a change in the school policy on the use of cell phones within the classroom 2. The challenges I will face in these endeavors will be: a. to engage more teachers in the benefits of doing this type of learning and showing them the benefits of this for the students future (with the help of my fellow coaches in IU19 and Anne Chervanka – TIMS) I will come up with projects that are cross curricular as well as between districts to connect the teachers and students to the outside world. b. I will need to address the changes in our policy with the IT director, Principal, Vice-principal and Superintendent. Once I have them on board we will need to address the change in our policy regarding this issue that we can then present to the school board. I will involve the help of my fellow coaches as well as Anne Chervanka. 3. The school would take on a much different appearance where students are more actively engaged in their learning by taking ownership in the process of creating the projects that are then presented to the outside audience (another district, community members, etc.). Also as I walk around the halls I will see the cell phones being used as an active learning tool.

Kathy Matis

1. My goals are to: 2. The challenges I will face in endeavors will be:
 * introduce the concepts of Project-Based Learning to my staff
 * help my teachers develop projectsthe essential questions in SAS
 * try to incorporate the American Film Institute movie lessons into one of our curriculum areas
 * encourage my district to see some of the learning possibilities of using cell phones educationally
 * working slowly with some staff members to change their opinion of other methods of instruction rather than lecture and note-taking, although there are only a few of these left on the staff. I will use modeling by myself and strong members in each department to model lessons that they have developed and share them in the small group setting of our department PD sessions
 * time is always an issue when working with new initiatives, but the administration has been very supportive in scheduling time for PD
 * Finding a teacher/teachers to add the AFI curriculum to their curriculum may be difficult; we may be able to add it as a semester elective for seniors, who have extra study halls
 * changing opinions of the academic uses of cell phones will be a challenge--however, I know that my principal will help promote this if we can start slowly, perhaps with experimenting with one class

My vision for the future of my school is for the physical building to not be a barrier. I would hope that we could offer many more courses through online availability and also for students to connect with others to collaborate on projects and research. I am hoping for many teachers to develop rigorous projects using PBL and increase higher-order thinking in most classes. I hope to develop partnerships with other schools to work on projects together.